Sounds Like BS. BS I've Heard A Lot Of.
This blog post about a sexual harassment reprimand posted on PJMedia by Charlie Martin is a story I've heard in slightly different forms (and scarier, worse forms) from a number of friends who are academics:

Back in the early 90′s, I was teaching at Durham Technical Community College while I was in grad school.

One day, one of my students, who normally wore sweats and jeans -- as I did -- came in wearing hose and heels, a cute denim skirt, and a white-and-aqua sweater with silver threads in it.

I said "Nice outfit! That's a pretty sweater."

The next day, I was seeing the Dean in Charge of Spanking Lecturers. Seems I'd said "something offensive". She couldn't tell me who had complained so I could apologize, what I'd said, as that might identify who had complained, but that I'd better apologize tout suite and I'd better watch myself.

As I wrote previously (unrelated to the mild compliment dispensed to the woman by Miller), in the book, Browne talks about how men haze each other, in the workplace and out:

Hazing is about going for somebody's Achilles heel. Browne has this interesting notion that some perceived sexual harassment actually isn't unequal but equal treatment -- guys playing the nines with women the same way they do with men. They just use sexual themes to tease them with because that's a sensitive spot with women.

Comments

I had a milder version of that experience about eight years ago. A much younger female coworker wore a new sweater to work. It looked very nice. I said, "Oh, a new sweater. That color looks good on you."

She replied rather sternly, "That comment could be construed as sexual harrassment!"

I was kind of stunned for a moment and then said, "Bullsh!t! That's not sexual harrassment!"

Since then I've never said anything to her that wasn't directly related our work; and never anything positive, complimentary or encouraging.

Ken R
at November 1, 2011 2:01 AM

Ken:

Since then I've never said anything to her that wasn't directly related our work; and never anything positive, complimentary or encouraging.

Yup. Her loss.

I've had black, gay, and female coworkers pull this sh*t - "you are responsible for my feeeeelings and must tiptoe around my swollen, completely arbitrary sense of grievance."

It always rebounds upon them - nobody will go near them or help them.

Ben David
at November 1, 2011 3:17 AM

In a previous job, I had an older woman working for me who came to work late constantly, claiming illness (it was usually on a Monday morning, suggesting a drinking problem). When I told her that there was a policy requiring her to call in to let me know she was going to be late, she said she was unaware of that policy. So I wrote out the policy on letterhead and asked her to sign it.

Next thing I know, I was being raked over the coals by my boss (also a woman) for sexual harassment. I quit soon after that. Leaving was one of the best career moves I made--my heart problems disappeared, my cholesterol level dropped sharply, and I was much happier.

Joe
at November 1, 2011 4:14 AM

The example you gave is not harassment, but the reality is that the professor isn't even sure if that was the reason he was reported. I'm not saying that he is guilty, just that we don't know what the actual complaint was.

Sexual harassment isn't such an easy thing. I had a boss who would regularly hit on me. At first I was flattered but not accepting of his advances. His advances became more aggressive until eventually one night he was drunk and had my cell number from work files and continuously called my phone telling me about all the dirty things he knew I wanted to do to him in graphic detail. At work the following Monday he glared at me all day. I spoke to his superior and was not trying to ruin his life or get him fired, but I did not think I deserved the level his aggression had escalated to. I was offered the chance to transfer or have him transferred and I chose the transfer.

He contacted me after that to explain to me that I was sending him signals telling him that I wanted him. I let him know that his next attempt to contact me would be reported. I did hear similar stories from other workers. So before everyone runs off claiming that sexual harassment is the result of feminazis who can't take a compliment, know that it does happen and it does affect people's lives in different ways. For me, I was happy to be removed from that boss and didn't think suing was necessary or ruing his life was necessary either, but I was grateful to have a company that took what happened seriously enough to address it.

Kristen
at November 1, 2011 4:43 AM

Kristen, if it never happened, there would be no law against it. The problem, as usual, is the ever-expanding and murkily defined boundary between what is acceptable and what is not. People dont know their rights, and routinely get into trouble for nothing.

As a supervisor, I get training on this topic every year. The law is fairly explicit. HR's interpretation of the law depends on what company you work for. None of the examples above, except yours, comes close to being actual harassment.

For example, my wife told a customer to back off, and had to explain why she was "rude" in turning away unwanted advances. Her HR department and manager are, to put it bluntly, clueless. They are not the minority.

MarkD
at November 1, 2011 5:17 AM

The basic problem is that most sexual harassment complaints in the workplace don't qualify as sexual harassment even under very liberal definitions of the term. But some women use the opportunity to file complaints vindictively. And there are simply some women who don't like men and may regard nearly any interaction as harassing. But the possibility of anti-male bias affecting the perception of harassment isn't typically envisioned by these policies. They're predicated on the assumption that all women are angels and all males are latent harassers.

noam
at November 1, 2011 7:34 AM

"The example you gave is not harassment, but the reality is that the professor isn't even sure if that was the reason he was reported. I'm not saying that he is guilty, just that we don't know what the actual complaint was."

You just answered your own question. The reason he's not guilty is that we don't know what the actual complaint was. He has the right to face his accuser. This stuff is modern day star chamber prosecutions.

MarkD, I agree that the boundaries are murky. What I see as a problem too though is the fact that there seem to be two schools of thought. School one is that any woman filing a complaint is a vindictive man-hater and school two which is that any form of even looking at a woman is sexual harassment. There seems to be no balance and I do think that part of that is because who would expect a boss to do certain things. All behavior is not predictable so its hard to define.

I don't say that there are cases that aren't due to someone being vindictive but its not all cases and it seems as if when its reported, the person reporting always seems to fall into one of those schools of thought.

Kristen
at November 1, 2011 8:21 AM

Interesting post, the gender dynamic at work needs more open conversation.

OK, this is going to sound bitchy but... does a technical community college really count as "academia"?

NicoleK
at November 1, 2011 8:49 AM

I agree with Dr. Browne:
"Hazing is about going for somebody's Achilles heel. Browne has this interesting notion that some perceived sexual harassment actually isn't unequal but equal treatment -- guys playing the nines with women the same way they do with men. They just use sexual themes to tease them with because that's a sensitive spot with women."

In the workplace context, hazing is both a test and an opportunity. The hazed party has opportunity to show they can take it; they can be human and laugh at themselves; they are not debilitated by excessive and brittle narcissism. This is a gift to the hazed party: it is opportunity to show they belong in the group; it is a hurdle to overcome, yet a reasonable hurdle which a reasonable person will overcome.

I can recall two situations, both from the 1990s, when women in two separate workplaces were hazed in exactly the fashion described by Dr. Browne: the men teased them; it was compliment that the men teased them; it was an opportunity for each woman; the men teased them re sexuality b/c (imo) that was an obvious place in which each woman was open for teasing. Neither woman could sense the overall dynamic of what was happening: both women were offended.

Through the years, I can recall at least a half a dozen cases, or maybe even a dozen cases, where workplace women deftly handled such teasing, gave as good as they got, and were welcomed into the workplace group as valued friends and colleagues.

Humans are going to be human. We must be careful to refrain from outlawing humanity. Men are oafs; are far more likely to say inappropriate things in the workplace. In situations which do not constitute harassment which affects careers, but which merely constitute perceived workplace atmosphere: so what? The penalty, for being an oafish man, ought not be a major infraction. Major penalties imply that women are defenseless, delicate flowers.

Also, re workplace atmosphere situations: the ultimate cure is the free market; the only true cure is the free market. Injecting the legal system skews everything for the worse.

gcotharn
at November 1, 2011 9:12 AM

@Kristen it's been well established that the great majority of sexual harassment claims are unfounded or do not rise to the level of harassment. The success rate for EEOC complaints is something like 5%. Even if you assume that this number is too low, it's evidence of the fact that there are a lot of women filing bogus complaints. For every 5 women who submit valid complaints we're destroying the lives of 95 men. Harassment may be bad, but it's not so egregious that it warrants ruining so many innocent people's lives.

noam
at November 1, 2011 9:15 AM

we take a harassment class every year for compliance, and it always reinforces the idea that we should simply never compliment anyone... because our intent isn't important at all, the reaction is the only thing that matters.

Simply put, it isn't worth my job to be friendly with a female co-worker, beyond pleasantries exclusive to work. There are 2 or 3 women I know well enough to compliment them, but I have to make sure no-one else is around...

The most insidious form of this is the women who is annoyed on another woman's behalf. Injecting herself into a situation that she isn't a party to. I've seen that one up close before... essentially that person was a morale killer in every group she was in. There was much rejoicing when she retired.

SwissArmyD
at November 1, 2011 9:37 AM

I recall a rather disturbing ad a few years back in my university paper. An instructor or an administrator in the sports department was being investigated for sexual harrassment charges, which the university was pursuing, although the "victim" in question didn't even want it pursued. Unfortunately I can't really recall the details or the outcome, sorry.

Meloni
at November 1, 2011 9:50 AM

I’m still waiting to be sexually harassed. Any takers out there?

Roger
at November 1, 2011 10:03 AM

The way I see it, laws regarding sexual harassment have no place in the legal system.

Because you are legislating peoples words. Words which will vary based on context.

For example, a man goes up to a woman and says...something. He's bald, overweight, and she's way out of his league and she knows it. She's offended and files a complaint.

Same woman has the same thing said to her by say...George Cloony, or some nonfamous person to whom she is very attracted and is well within her league...and the result is that they go out on a date.

When the existance of the "crime" is so subjective that it is dependent upon how whether or not the possible accuser is attracted to the possible accused...then any law supporting an accusation is beyond unsustainable.

Yes I'm well aware some women will just fall apart and die if men aren't solicitous of their feelings. And quite frankly I do not give a fuck.

The world is a big mean place. Get thick skin and get over it, or get out of the way of those who can.

Robert
at November 1, 2011 10:11 AM

I think that we'd be better off handling sexual harassment as a standard personnel conflict, rather than a special case of sexual conflict. Most large organizations have procedures in place to deal with grievances lodged by one party against another. These are typically resolved by arbitration. But with SH we've set up these star chambers and impose such outsized penalties that it prevents people from actually reconciling problems. Because most conflicts that fall under sexual harassment can be remediated w/o firing someone or forcing them into another job. I also suspect that if arbitration were the default course of action, that we'd see fewer frivolous complaints because the complainant would need to reveal themselves and justify why they feel harassed.

Keep in mind that sexual harassment policies weren't developed in response to the prevalence of actual harassment in organizations. They arose in response to litigation risks created by the Federal government and the courts.

jj
at November 1, 2011 10:19 AM

It doesn't even have to be something you say to a woman. One of the guys my dad worked with had a picture of his family on his desk. The picture was of all of them on a boat. His two teenage daughters were wearing bathing-suits. One of the women in the office felt like it was "offensive" and he had to take it home. So she was basically saying that not only was he a harasser, but that he was probably pedophile as well. How do you reason with person like that?

Sheepmommy
at November 1, 2011 10:27 AM

Something similar happened to my hubby last year. Someone overheard hubby and another employee talking about something. Probably politics. That anonymous someone filed a complaint and my hubby and the other guy were called onto the carpet. He was not told who was offended, nor was he told the subject matter that was apparently offensive. He was just told to not do so again in the future.

LauraGr
at November 1, 2011 10:41 AM

I have seen an incident at work that, from my perception, rose to a real level of sexual harassment. This was a male supervisor who had a habit of making comments to and about a particular female employee regarding the types of sexual situations he would like to get in with her. She moved to a different branch and it was my understanding that she spoke with her boss's (harasser) supervisor and her move was to help her get out of that environment. I would have really hated being in her position in that job, it was quite distracting to the larger work group even though we weren't being directly impacted and I was glad she got a way out of the situation.

That being said, I was just laughing with a female friend this morning about how silly the sexual harassment training we all have to take these days is, and how after each year's training the "sexual harassment" level (not real sexual harassment) spikes right after the training because we are all joking and using the completely hysterical pick up lines that they feature in the training videos on each other. And I am CERTAIN that if that supervisor from long ago who was genuinely harassing that employee were to see them, they would have absolutely no effect on him because I think he was just an unhinged person who for what ever reason didn't give a shit that he was making everyone of his employees uncomfortable and one specific employee miserable (actually he seemed to get off on it). Interestingly, he got promoted to a position where he has no supervisory role anymore. It seems like the company figured out what part of his personality was an asset and what part was a problem and found a spot for him where they could still get work out of him without messing up a whole team.

AK
at November 1, 2011 11:13 AM

I feel really fortunate to work in an environment where we can make the occasional crude joke or pass a compliment and not (women and men included) feel victimized by them.

Meloni
at November 1, 2011 11:16 AM

Not sure if this will work, cause I'm a technological idiot, but this pic is suited for the topic.

Ah, yes, the young academic must have not realized that he had offended the sensibilities of one of the Ladies of Perpetually Feeling Uncomfortable (TM).

He must have not been that attractive back then. Were George Clooney an academic, this crap would not have happened to him. Sexual harassment policy can be used by women as a tool to keep unattractive men from hitting on them at work.

mpetrie98
at November 1, 2011 11:37 AM

I find the context of the complaint in the article interesting. A girl who normally was grungy looked nice and took a compliment badly. In other words, such women probably dress grungy most of the time because they dislike attention from men. She probably decided to dress up one day and then, gasp, a MAN notices her and she got upset. The reasons for her phobia can be numerous: She maybe is a lesbian, maybe she had a bad boyfriend, she may have issues with her father, etc. but these complaints usually come from women who are unattractive or not exceptionally good looking or trashy.

Sexual harassment complaints, even today, are like wildfire because the education classes teach women to levy them at the slightest provocation. So even pretty women could engage in them. Here's the modern rule of thumb in post-feminist paradise: If you don't know a woman well and haven't established a clear rapport with her that you're close colleagues, watch EVERYTHING you say around them. In addition, watch what they say and note it. This way, if they levy a charge against you later, you can come back with: "Well, they said all this and I was just following their lead!"

I like the show MadMen and have noticed how even the left have secretly fallen in love with an era when women were women and even if the men did offensive things in the workplace, they at least could be themselves. Now, no more Christmas parties, no more provocative outfits, no jokes.

PolishKnight
at November 1, 2011 1:21 PM

I like the show MadMen and have noticed how even the left have secretly fallen in love with an era when women were women and even if the men did offensive things in the workplace, they at least could be themselves. Now, no more Christmas parties, no more provocative outfits, no jokes."

PolishKnight, you're significant other is a very lucky person.

Kristen
at November 1, 2011 3:34 PM

"Through the years, I can recall at least a half a dozen cases, or maybe even a dozen cases, where workplace women deftly handled such teasing, gave as good as they got, and were welcomed into the workplace group as valued friends and colleagues."

Claudia Christian tells a story about the lawyers at Netter Entertainment, the producers of Babylon 5, coming to speak to the entire cast and asking them to sign a pledge not to sexually harass each other.

The cast, including several "alpha" women like Claudia, told them hell no, that's why we work here!

That's a 'way different dynamic. I've had the chance to speak to six of the principals from B5, and they act like family. (Don't get Claudia mad.) You just don't see that in businesses, especially those where jobs are handed out via quotas.

Oh yah, the women of Mad Men are just so happy. (In fact it looks to me like most of the men are miserable too) I love the show, but it is not a flattering portrayal of the era.

People love the style and Jon Hamm.

Sam
at November 1, 2011 5:58 PM

One thing that distinctly sits in mind from one of my corporate training meetings. If Joe says something to Mary that Sally finds offensive and I over heard it but didn't report I could be convicted of a crime. Something like Participation in Creating a Sexual Hostile Environment. Probably not real likely to happen but clearly possible from what the lawyer said.

That is why I pretend to hear and see and know nothing. Just like Sgt. Schultz.

The Former Banker
at November 1, 2011 10:22 PM

'lol' Thanks lujlp!

Robert
at November 2, 2011 2:33 AM

That's right, lujlp.

Be handsome.
Be attractive.
Don't be unattractive.

mpetrie98
at November 2, 2011 12:25 PM

"Someone overheard hubby and another employee talking about something. Probably politics. That anonymous someone filed a complaint and my hubby and the other guy were called onto the carpet. "

That's exactly what ended my career with one company. A friend and I were in a closed conference room, with the door locked, having a private conversation. During the conversation, the subject came of a mutual female acquaintance of ours (not an employee of the company) who was rather wild. And that was the extent of what was said about it... "XXX... wild woman!"

A female co-worker had taken a glass to the door and was eavesdropping on us. She reported this bit of the conversation as sexual harassment. We were both suspended for a week and had to give up some privileges. About a year later I was informed that my division no longer had budget for me, and I was on my own as far as finding a place elsewhere in the company. I did, but I received no more raises or promotions, and I was shut out of several activities that I volunteered for. The message was clear. I found another job.